Engage Cymru

Engage Cymru is the leading membership organisation for gallery education in Wales and has over 70 members, including gallery and museum educators, teachers, local authority officers and artists.

Engage Cymru promotes gallery education through advocacy, regular area group meetings, networking and professional development training events, and through its research projects.

COVID-19 freelance artist commission

WAHWN (Wales Arts Health & Wellbeing Network) with funding from Wales Arts International has commissioned 3 freelance practitioners to initiate discussions with arts and health networks and practitioners in Ireland, focusing on how the Covid-19 restrictions are impacting their practice and exploring possibilities for collaboration. 

Artists Clare Charles and Gail Howard are scoping ideas with Outlandish Theatre Platform and musician Iori Haugen will be sharing practice with Waterford Healing Arts Trust (WHAT) and freelance musicians based in Ireland, looking at both challenges and opportunities. This work will help to build the capacity of WAHWN, whilst opening up opportunities for longer term partnership and collaboration. WAHWN will be sharing details of a number of bursary places to attend the WHAT Check In Check Up professional development event in Dublin in November. Further details to follow.

Iori Haugen will be taking up his new role shortly as Music Coordinator for Swansea Bay University Health Board, working alongside Arts & Health Coordinator Prue Thimbleby. Clare Charles and Gail Howard are both Made in Roath artists.

For further details contact Angela Rogers, WAHWN Coordinator info@wahwn.cymru 

About the Wales Arts Health and Wellbeing Network

WAHWN, the Wales Arts Health & Wellbeing Network, is coordinated by Engage Cymru with funding from the Arts Council of Wales. WAHWN launched in 2019 and has since expanded to include almost 300 arts and health professional members. 90 members have participated in Creative & Credible arts and health evaluation training over the past year, aimed at supporting colleagues to deliver robust and credible evidence of their work.

Any Wales-based colleagues delivering arts, health and well-being focused work can sign up for free, upload their profile, view and post opportunities, blogs and a wide range of resources in the Knowledge Bank section. Join the Wales Arts Health and Wellbeing Network at wahwn.cymru.

Video presentation of Angela Rogers, WAHWN (Wales Arts Health & Well-being Network) Coordinator talking about how the Network has evolved and developments in the arts and health sector in Wales. Filmed by artist Abigail Sidebotham at the request of Chris Fremantle, Robert Gordon University.

Arts & Business Cymru Award 2019

Congratulations to Western Power Distribution who won the Business and Brand Identity 2019 award for their partnership work with Engage Cymru, The Gate Arts Centre, Music in Hospitals and Care, the National Museum and the Riverfront, Newport at the Arts and Business Cymru Awards on Thursday 11 July 2019.

Western Power Distribution also won the Admiral Business of the Year Award, with the following statement made upon the reception of this award:

WPD’s focus is clear: a commitment to the community it serves and the most vulnerable members of society within it… from the small Pembrokeshire based Engage Cymru’s dementia friendly art galleries to National Museum Wales’ Big Pit, WPD’s sponsorship has enabled community activities, improved understanding and found a new way to tackle social isolation.

The judges congratulated WPD on its clarity in effectively communicating messages while supporting such a variety of arts organisations across Wales and agreed that the many partnerships stood as a real model of excellence in the field.

Engage Cymru is proud to partner with Western Power Distribution and grateful for the support we receive. Congratulations to all of the winners and nominees recognised by the Arts & Business Cymru Awards.